Holidays Everwhere

 Happy 4th of July!!

I love America, and I love getting to celebrate its birthday! Perhaps that is partially since it’s so close to my own birthday (June 29th), but as a side note thanks for all of the birthday wishes - they really mean a lot! Today is unique since this will be my first (and hopefully last) time spending the 4th of July outside of the US, but wherever I go I know a part of my heart will always be there. I’m so grateful for the foundation of freedom established by our founding fathers that endures to this day. They were truly inspired men who placed their trust in God. The Constitution that they helped establish was an essential part of preparing the world for the Restoration, and I can hardly imagine what my life or the entire world would be like without it. American history, much like the Book of Mormon, is truly the story of God intervening on behalf of an imperfect people, and while we continue to have ups and downs as a nation I know that we truly do live in a choice land and that God will continue to watch over us if we stay faithful to His principles of love, freedom, and righteousness. (Ether 2:12). As the world continues to grow darker I hope that we can all continue to rise above the division and pessimism that is so prevalent in our day and stand as lights of optimism and unity to our communities and our nation!

This week was an interesting mix of slower and faster days with three more exchanges sprinkled in, but there were some really cool experiences that I’d love to share!

Monday night we had an awesome miracle after having dinner with a family of members who live in the City of Boucherville which is just north of Longueuil. The food was delicious and it was really fun to talk with the husband who is from Switzerland about what it’s like (basically they all speak different languages and while they don’t always get along they tolerate each other in order to stay independent from the countries that surround them haha). Bourcherville is about 20 minutes away from where we live, and it’s not the easiest area to do missionary work so we honestly don’t go there very often. Since we were in the area, Elder Freestone and I decided to take the opportunity to stop by some other members that lived just around the corner that we hadn’t met. After setting up a lesson with the member for next week, I figured we could take the long way back to our car by finishing the loop in the hopes of finding someone to talk to. About halfway down the street we saw a large white dog and as my companion went to pet him we started a conversation with the couple who live there. We explained that we are missionaries to the husband and much to our surprise he asked us to take a seat on his outdoor furniture to talk. He said he is someone who wants to believe, but struggles due to the corruption that is prevalent in many churches today but I got to share one of my favorite scriptures with him (Alma 32:27) and we explained that our purpose is to help others grow their faith in Jesus Christ. We had a really amazing conversation about the restored Gospel and at the end we gave him a Book of Mormon. What made this whole event even more miraculous was that my companion later told me that he had prayed the night before to be able to find someone in Boucherville since he knew it was a less fruitful part of our area. 

The first two exchanges of this week with Elder Da Silva and Elder Bird were honestly pretty slow but still fun, but the third exchange with Elder Pruett was seriously an awesome day! We talked to a lot of really cool people, and we had some fun unplanned service opportunities! Our exchange was on July 1st aka Canada, but apparently everyone here in Quebec celebrates Canadian 4th of July by moving or helping someone else move. We literally helped two random groups of people move while we were out finding and then helped a really cool family who’ve met with missionaries for a long time move later that afternoon. We also had a very memorable lesson with our amazing friend Jordany where we planned to read the introduction to the Book of Mormon with him, but he ended up continuing and reading all the way through the testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith! He asks very thoughtful questions and is truly a seeker of truth, and I can’t wait for him to continue reading the Book of Mormon!

The rest of this weekend was also pretty busy with lots of lessons as well as the rebaptism for the wife of one of our good friends in the ward! We helped fill up the font and got to be witnesses for the baptism and stand in the circle for the confirmation and it was a really uplifting spiritual experience. There is something about watching a baptism that never fails to bring a smile to your face! The last tender mercy I’ll share for this letter was also having our new friend Stanislas come to church on Sunday! I’d actually never met him in person since Elder Lund met him on an exchange, but we’d texted him to let him know when our church services are and much to our surprise he texted us right at the end of sacrament meeting to say that he was in the parking lot! He didn’t realize that we meet inside of the chapel instead of the temple so needless to say he was rather confused when he approached the gate to the temple grounds haha. He ended up having a great experience though at Sunday school, and we’re planning on doing a chapel tour with him this week!

Time is truly flying by, but I am so grateful for the privilege I have to be a missionary!

Love you all,

Elder Jackson